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| Black and Gold Pittsburgh. Dustin McGrew photo (dustinmcgrewphoto.com) |
Hello, this is Paris,
I used to teach in Johnstown, I'm from Turkeyfoot,
Everything we do is prettty much archaic.
The academic world is very egocentric.
Helen's is a restaurant in these mountains east of Pittsburgh.
This is an 1860s house.
There's a library in this house.
Helen of ancient Troy's lover was Paris.
The Paris of Appalachia is how some people see Pittsburgh,
The Turkeyfoot of Appalachia is Turkeyfoot.
To feel you are at the center of the world is egocentric,
To feel this is true is egocentric and archaic.
Swimming in an unpolluted creek might be archaic,
Especially if the creek is near your house.
A narcissist, like a poet, is egocentric.
Once I heard a woman say mon dieu on Pont Neuf in Paris.
Do women make poetry in Turkeyfoot?
They must make poetry in Pittsburgh.
Troy Hill sits on a plateau above the Allegheny River in Pittsburgh.
To have children is both archaic and not archaic.
Once I met a man off the grid in Turkeyfoot.
If the sun didn't shine, he couldn't watch TV in his house.
Maybe I should've called my daughter in NYC, the way Paris is Paris.
To think NY's the center of the universe is egocentric.
To think your daughter's cute and looked like you is egocentric.
The safest part of Appalachia might not be Pittsburgh.
You never think of dangerous places in Paris,
But there are some, though the ideas are archaic
As having a gallery in your house
In ancient Troy, not up-to-date Turkeyfoot.
Let's hightail it to Turkeyfoot
In the 21st Century full of egocentric
Copernicans, build a sun-filled house,
And pretend we're safe in Pittsburgh,
Where even video games have become archaic,
And we'll make better poetry than Paris in Paris.
I wonder if there's a Paris in Turkeyfoot.
Is it archaic to be egocentric,
Like a tackle in Pittsburgh, big as a house?
—Personalizing Bernadette Mayer's "Helen Parsons Sestina"
from The Paris Review, Fall 2012
